MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Santos is forecasted to win next Sunday by a wide margin

Former Defence minister Juan Manuel Santos has promised to continue Uribe’s policies

Colombian incumbent presidential candidate Juan Manuel Santos is poised for an overwhelming victory in next Sunday’s runoff according to the latest public opinion polls published Sunday in Bogotá’s main newspapers.

The poll from El Tiempo showed a vote intention for Santos of 65.1% while his contender and former mayor of Bogotá Antanas Mockus figures with 28%.

However the reliability of Colombian opinion polls has been seriously questioned from the moment they anticipated a tie in the first round when Santos actually doubled Mockus, and was only four points short of the 50% plus one to avoid the run-off.

The Sunday poll says 30 million Colombians are registered to vote and 4.1% will vote blank. In the first round almost half the voters did not turn up at the polls. Colombia contrary to other Latinamerican countries has traditionally a low turn out.

The poll from Datexco interviewed 1.937 people who effectively said they would vote and was done at the beginning of last week covering 23 of the country’s 32 provinces.

The two other polls released over the weekend show Santos well ahead: Inavamer Gallup gives the former Defense minister 66.5% and 27.3% to Mockus while Centro Nacional de Consultoría shows 60.8% and 28.3%.

Santos has promised to continue with the policies of President Uribe: ‘democracy with security’.

Uribe strong hand policies with the guerrilla and drug cartels have helped recover lost ground and now have them on the run, while an open economy has attracted billions of dollars in foreign investments.

Since taking office the outgoing president has enjoyed one of the highest performance ratings in recent Colombian history.